Kenny Wellington

Part of the original Light Of The World, Kenny is one of the UK’s finest musicians and the band’s influence on the Brit Funk scene and the subsequent club culture explosion, is in no question…

Alongside Kenny in that original LOTW line up was David ‘Baps’ Baptiste (sax/flute), Chris Etienne (percussion) Peter ‘Stepper’ Hinds (keyboards), Jean-Paul Maunick (guitar/vocals), Everton McCalla (drums), Neville ‘Breeze’ McKrieth (guitar/vocals) and the late Paul ‘Tubbs’ Williams (bass).

Their string of hits in the early 1980’s gave us soul music with a London accent and their highly acclaimed ‘Round Trip’ LP made the UK album chart. With DJs like Tony Blackburn, Chris Hill, Robbie Vincent & Steve Walsh championing their sound, LOTW were soon being heard by a much wider audience.

But it wasn’t long before the band split and Kenny, along with Breeze and Baps, formed Beggar & Co, going on to enjoy more chart success with ‘(Somebody) Help Me Out’. In 1985, Kenny & Breeze reformed LOTW again after working on some remixes of ‘London Town’ and ‘Time’ with DJ/producer John Morales and then briefly again in 1990 for a recording for Chrysalis.

Kenny on the main stage at Summer Soulstice 2016.
Photo by Jen Jenny B © Summer Soulstice Ltd.

Further configurations of the band followed and by 1999, Kenny had assembled most of the original band, including McKrieth and Baptiste, to co-produce another album ‘Inner Voices’ along with Richard Bull. Nat Augustin was also on board for the recording along with bass player Frank Felix who, after years of live performances with the band, was invited by Kenny to join. Other than featuring on compilation albums, this was the last studio album involving the original LOTW band members.

In 2009 at our third Summer Soulstice, the live performance of Beggar & Co (The Original Light Of The World) saw the cream of the Brit-funk scene from the past three decades line up on stage with Kenny keen to deliver a quality show. Alongside Breeze (LOTW/Beggar & Co), Billy Osborne (LTD and brother of Jeffrey Osbourne), Camelle Hinds (Central Line), Sid Gauld (Incognito), Peter Hinds (LOTW/Atmosfear/Sa-Ha-Ra), sax player Ray Carless, Orphy Robinson (Savanna) plus vocalists Noel McKoy, Glen Goldsmith and Ingrid Mansfield Allman (Freeez). Together they put on one heck of a show, raising the bar for the event as a whole.

A regular at our event, in 2016 Kenny released a long awaited solo album entitled ‘Free Spirit’ on Expansion Records which among others featured Camelle and the late Augie Johnson (Side Effect). He once again returned to Summer Soulstice alongside Breeze as the original Beggar & Co line-up, this time joining members of Hi-Tension & Steve Salvari from Central Line, earning Kenny an impressive fourth Soulstice ‘cap’! Their performance together paved the way to the formation of the Brit Funk Association, who released their album ‘Full Circle’ in 2018.